Claire Tomalin Quotes

Biographers use historians more than historians use biographers, although there can be two-way traffic - e.g., the ever-growing production of biographies of women is helping to change the general picture of the past presented by historians.

Claire Tomalin

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Quotes to Explore

• I was devastated when I got the review for my first book. The book came out a couple years before the women's movement broke through, and people were putting it down, asking, 'Why does the woman in this book need to get a divorce? Why can't she just shut up and be happy?'

  

  Gail Sheehy
  • People
  • Up
  • Women

• I was growing up in the 50's and 60's. Back then they didn't even know what dyslexia was.

  

  Caitlyn Jenner
  • Up
  • Growing
  • Know

• In Kenya women are the first victims of environmental degradation, because they are the ones who walk for hours looking for water, who fetch firewood, who provide food for their families.

  

  Wangari Maathai
  • Women
  • Food
  • Water

• A fashion show is like a 10-minute play, but there's all this anticipation; Everyone arriving, finding their seats, then there's 10 minutes of people walking past and clothes and music, then the whole thing is finished.

  

  Felicity Jones
  • People
  • Music
  • Past

• You have to really love women in order to really just have a respect for women and love them. No man - I don't care what kind of man it is, how feminine he is - they never could understand what we go through as far as physically and mentally.

  

  Vanessa Ferlito
  • Women
  • Love
  • Respect

• All my life, I've been working with male directors, which I've really enjoyed. And I'm lucky in that I've worked with men who have a lot of respect for women. But working with a woman is a different experience. It feels like the communication is different.

  

  Gal Gadot
  • Life
  • Men
  • Different

• I am just doing photo shoots. It's not something that extraordinary. I'm not a great artist, I'm not writing books, I'm not a painter, and people in the streets ask me for a picture or a note, and I say, 'Why?'

  

  Carine Roitfeld
  • People
  • Great
  • Writing

• The more insight I get, the more scared I get of women in general.

  

  Dan Byrd
  • Women
  • Scared
  • Insight

• When you are growing up, everyone will help you. When you reach the top, everyone will start pulling you down. The same people who help you will be the same people who try to pull you down.

  

  Kapil Dev
  • People
  • Up
  • Help

• I've done stuff in the past and followed in the footsteps of my heroes, and each time, it felt a little bit surreal.

  

  T. J. Perkins
  • Time
  • Done
  • Past

• It takes leadership to improve safety. And I started off the movement in my time, but the person who has done more over the past 20 to 30 years and who has led it is Professor Sid Watkins.

  

  Jackie Stewart
  • Time
  • Done
  • Past

• I respond very well to well-written material and women who have had an effect on society, something tragic or monumental has happened to them.

  

  Samantha Morton
  • Women
  • Society
  • Respond

• What is sad for women of my generation is that they weren't supposed to work if they had families. What were they going to do when the children are grown - watch the raindrops coming down the window pane?

  

  Jackie Kennedy
  • Work
  • Women
  • Children

• My kids have a competitive drive I never had growing up.

  

  Damon Wayans
  • Up
  • Kids
  • Growing

• Writers are historians, too. It is in literature that the greater truths about a people and their past are found.

  

  F. Sionil Jose
  • People
  • Past
  • Literature

• I have been immeasurably honored to serve the people of Maine for nearly 40 years in public office and for the past 17 years in the United States Senate. It was incredibly difficult to decide that I would not seek a fourth term in the Senate.

  

  Olympia Snowe
  • People
  • Past
  • Difficult

• Habit, if not resisted, soon becomes necessity.

  

  Saint Augustine
  • Wisdom
  • Habit
  • Necessity

• I was very, very sick when I was growing up in Russia. The ambulance constantly came to our house. I had horrible asthma that is easily treated in America, but they didn't even have inhalers back in Russia.

  

  Gary Shteyngart
  • Up
  • America
  • House

• So we all got basically what we wanted, and as far as the women are concerned, he figured that 30 good women could handle a crew of 300 anyway. So that's how we ended up with our crew.

  

  Majel Barrett
  • Up
  • Good
  • Women

• Fashion really is women's liberation in a lot of ways. Look at how many women in this country are depressed about how they look and how they think they have to look! It's really sad. And it's not about money.

  

  Iris Apfel
  • Women
  • Country
  • Money

• People who truly love their lives are the most inspiring people of all.

  

  Jen Sincero
  • People

• I wouldn't call myself a dancer. I would never even dance in a club - I can't move my feet! I'm terribly shy about moving. I feel comfortable in my body, but dancing is like learning another language.

  

  Matthew James Thomas
  • Learning
  • Moving
  • Dance

• Biographers use historians more than historians use biographers, although there can be two-way traffic - e.g., the ever-growing production of biographies of women is helping to change the general picture of the past presented by historians.

  

  Claire Tomalin
  • Women
  • Past
  • Growing